Undead Catastrophe, New York in Peril

The space around Thunder Temple temporarily returned to calm, but Lin Ye and The Ancient One both knew this was only a brief respite before the storm. The cold gaze of Endless Bone Graveyard hung above them like the Sword of Damocles.

Lin Ye did not relax. He continued honing his newly acquired power in the training grounds, especially the combination of [Soul-Purifying Thunder] and [Thunderflash: Time Lag]. He tried coating his fists, kicks, and weapons with purifying lightning while moving at extreme speeds, hoping to effectively harm undead enemies even in high-speed combat.

However, the next attack arrived in a way completely beyond their expectations.

It did not try to infiltrate the area around the Sanctuary again. Instead... it chose densely populated and relatively poorly defended New York City!

Late at night in Queens, New York, Peter Parker had just finished an unsuccessful online interview with Stark Industries and was dejectedly swinging home on his webs.

Suddenly, the Spider-Sense on his wrist blared frantically at an unprecedented frequency! It was not warning him about any particular direction, but... the entire sky!

He jerked his head up and saw dozens of silent tears of varying sizes rip open in the air above several cemeteries on the outskirts of Queens, as though space were cheap cloth! Beyond those rifts was not a brilliant starry sky, but that nauseating, dim yellow world made of countless bones—the Endless Bone Graveyard!

The next second, countless undead creatures poured out of those rifts as if they were dumplings being dumped into a pot!

There were transparent wraiths floating in midair and radiating icy auras; skeleton warriors pieced together from shattered bones, clattering as they moved; rotting zombies dripping pus; and even several gigantic undead beasts formed from countless animal bones! Like floodwaters bursting through a broken dam, they instantly surged into the surrounding streets and residential districts!

Piercing alarms rang across all of New York! Terrified screams, the chilling howls of undead creatures, scattered gunfire, and explosions dragged the city that never slept into a nightmare in an instant!

"My God..." Peter stared at the chaos and terror erupting below, his heart nearly stopping from fright! But he barely hesitated before firing a web and swinging toward the area where the undead were pouring out most densely! "I have to stop them!"

Inside Thunder Temple, the alarms were equally shrill!

"Warning! Massive dimensional rifts have appeared simultaneously in Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx, New York City! Large numbers of undead creatures are pouring through! The rifts are more stable than before and cannot be quickly closed!" Remy said urgently.

On the holographic screens, several parts of New York had become seas of fire and chaos. The sight of the undead tide spreading through the city was horrifying.

Lin Ye's expression darkened instantly. "Luring the tiger away from the mountain? Or are they simply venting their spite?"

Rather than directly attacking the heavily defended Sanctuary, the enemy had chosen to attack New York. That was undoubtedly far more insidious and difficult to handle! He could not sit by and watch countless civilians be slaughtered by the undead!

"What's the situation on The Ancient One's side?"

"Kamar-Taj is doing everything it can to close the rifts, but there are too many of them, and they are too stable. They need time! Small-scale rifts have also appeared sporadically across the globe, tying down some of our forces!"

"Damn it!" Lin Ye cursed and made his decision in an instant. "Lock onto the areas with the densest undead concentrations and the most trapped civilians! Prepare multithreaded, precise long-range strikes! At the same time, prepare to teleport me into the skies above New York!"

He could not watch Kamar-Taj fight alone while he hid away. His purifying thunder was more effective against the undead than most magic!

"Command confirmed. Long-range strike system activated. Teleportation coordinates locked: stratosphere above New York City."

In a flash of lightning, Lin Ye appeared thousands of meters above New York. Looking down, he saw black smoke rising from multiple parts of the once-prosperous city, which had descended into utter chaos. Countless undead creatures spread like a plague, exchanging fire with hastily responding police officers and arriving National Guard troops. But ordinary weapons had little effect on the undead, and the battle lines were steadily collapsing.

Even more terrifyingly, undead continued to stream endlessly from those dimensional rifts!

"Remy, prioritize the emergence points and large undead units!"

"Targets locked. Divine Punishment system activated."

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Several precise lightning laser beams descended from orbital satellites like the fingers of a god, accurately blasting apart several undead beasts charging at the front and several areas with the densest undead concentrations, buying the ground forces a brief moment to catch their breath.

But more undead flooded in from every direction.

Lin Ye locked onto the largest rift in Queens. A mountain-sized Sutured Abomination, formed from countless twisted human and animal bones, was trying to crawl halfway out of it!

He raised his hand, and highly condensed purifying lightning in his palm shone as brilliantly as the sun!

"Thunder Punishment: Purifying Light!"

A thick pillar of pure white light descended from the sky and poured precisely into the rift!

BOOM!!!

The ultimate force of light and purification erupted! The undead creatures near the rift vanished instantly like snowflakes thrown into a steel furnace! The massive abomination let out a pained wail as its enormous skeletal body shattered inch by inch beneath the purifying lightning, turning into ash! Even the rift itself shook violently and shrank by nearly half!

However, just as Lin Ye prepared to attack the next rift, a sudden change occurred!

From the largest rift above Brooklyn, no undead emerged. Instead, it abruptly projected a massive, bizarre phantom pyramid formed from pale bone dust and dark energy!

The phantom pyramid rapidly solidified and released a terrifying suction force! Yet what it absorbed was not matter, but... the city's lights, electricity, and even... the fear and life force of living beings!

Countless visible white motes of light—energy—and pale gray mist—fear and life force—were forcibly drawn from across New York City and gathered into the phantom pyramid! Vast sections of the city began losing power and falling into darkness, while the people's panic multiplied exponentially!

After absorbing that energy, the phantom pyramid became even more solid. From its base, it began spewing thicker death mist, almost tangible in density! Beneath the mist, the undead creatures seemed pumped full of stimulants, becoming even more ferocious and powerful. Some stranger undead wizards even began appearing, capable of casting simple death spells!

"It's absorbing the entire city's energy and life force to strengthen itself and the undead army!" Lin Ye instantly understood the enemy's vicious plan! This was not merely destruction—they were turning New York into a giant death-energy converter!

He had to destroy that phantom pyramid!

Lin Ye became a streak of lightning and shot toward Brooklyn!

But the instant he approached, the phantom pyramid suddenly fired a twisted grayish-white beam! Wherever the beam passed, space itself seemed corroded by "death," becoming fragile and unstable!

Lin Ye activated [Thunderflash: Time Lag] and narrowly dodged it! The grayish-white beam grazed past him and struck a distant building. The building instantly aged, weathered, and collapsed at a visible rate, as though it had endured a thousand years!

What a bizarre attack! It involved the laws of time and death!

Lin Ye did not dare be careless. He fully activated [Soul Barrier] to resist the pervasive corrosion of deathly energy, while continuously hurling purifying lightning spears from both hands at the phantom pyramid!

However, the phantom was extraordinarily resilient. The purifying lightning could not destroy it quickly, only sending ripples across its surface and consuming the energy it had drawn from the city. Yet the speed at which it spewed death mist and fired grayish-white beams did not diminish in the slightest!

The situation in the city below grew ever more dire! Empowered by the mist, the undead army became increasingly savage, and casualties rose sharply!

"Mr. Lin! Do you need help?" A slightly youthful but anxious voice came through the Sanctuary's communication channel. Peter had previously obtained a one-time emergency communicator by accident.

Amid the chaos, Lin Ye glanced down and saw Spider-Man struggling to use his webs to pull a group of trapped civilians out of an undead encirclement. His movements were clearly somewhat frantic, yet he persisted.

"Protect yourself and the civilians! Stay away from the mist!" Lin Ye replied, his thoughts racing.

This could not continue! He had to cut off the pyramid's energy supply!

"Remy! Calculate the city power grid nodes and the convergence points where the life energy is being siphoned! I want to cripple its energy-absorption process!"

"Calculating... The primary convergence point is directly beneath the phantom pyramid... but forcibly interrupting it may cause an energy backflow and inflict even greater damage on the city's power grid..."

"We can't worry about that now! Do it!"

Lightning flared in Lin Ye's eyes. Rather than continuing to wear down the phantom pyramid head-on, he suddenly dived toward the ground directly beneath it!

At the same time, The Ancient One's voice sounded beside his ear through magical transmission. "Lin Ye! Hold on! Kamar-Taj's reinforcements will arrive soon! We've found a way to temporarily stabilize the other rifts!"

Lin Ye did not respond. He focused all his attention below! He saw it: a huge vortex made of pale energy on the ground, madly drawing out the energy and life force of all New York!

"Stop... now!"

He fell like a meteor, both fists wrapped in immensely compressed thunder containing the powers of [Purification] and [Concussion], and slammed them down at the energy vortex!

BOOM!!!!!!!

The terrifying explosion illuminated the entire city block!

(End of Chapter Forty-Seven)